Chapter 34: The Subconscious Inhibitor

A dozen minutes later, Xia An and a limping Zhang Huai'an arrived at the scene one after the other. They had spotted the flashlight beam from Zhou Mo’s phone deep within the dense thicket, which led them and the rest of the City Guard unit to his location.

Zhou Mo had gradually come to understand the structure of the City Guard. Those like Xia An and Zhang Huai'an, who usually wore plain clothes, were core members equivalent to detectives, while those in uniform were more like auxiliary police.

Upon reaching the scene and seeing the twitching, long-legged woman on the ground, Xia An, who had been yawning, stared at Zhou Mo in complete shock. "You actually ran into her! How did you manage to find her?"

Zhou Mo pulled out a dog leash and gave it a shake in front of Xia An. "I came out to walk the dog to clear my head, and I just happened to run into her."

Xia An frowned. "Since when do you have a dog?"

Zhou Mo shrugged. "There’s a stray dog near my apartment complex that I’ve gotten friendly with, so I took it for a stroll and just happened to stumble upon this woman."

Xia An’s mouth twitched. "Do you really need to walk a stray dog? And with a leash, no less..."

Zhang Huai'an, leaning on his crutch nearby, looked utterly astounded. "I’ve been investigating this case for two full weeks. I even dyed my hair a flashy yellow to go undercover on night runs, and you just stumbled upon her like this..."

Even the upright Zhang Huai'an felt a bit unbalanced. All their hard work couldn't compete with the efficiency of Zhou Mo going out for a casual walk.

Xia An’s divergent thinking began to act up again. She fought the urge to start knitting and tried to calm herself down. Looking at Zhou Mo, who was wearing sunglasses in the middle of the night to act cool, she felt as if her face had been slapped again, burning with heat.

These three incidents fell under the jurisdiction of the Zhongshan Street City Guard. Because they were random killings, the unit hadn't found any useful leads in days, forced to rely on vague testimonies and sheer luck. Sometimes they couldn't even find the murder weapon, and there were even cases of killers floating through the air.

In truth, because the City Guard was a recently established organization, the entire system was still incomplete, leading to a low clearance rate. After all, subconscious monsters didn't follow criminal logic. This was exactly why Xia An felt the sting of embarrassment.

It hadn't even been ten hours since he received the files! Yet, a simple stroll had solved one of the cases. The smile on Zhou Mo's face felt as if he were saying, "You City Guards are so incompetent!"

Xia An took a few deep breaths to steady herself before looking at Zhou Mo. "Regardless, you’ve completed a case. I’ll make sure your name is on the incident report. The bounty for this one isn't high, probably just over a thousand dollars."

Hearing that there was money to be made, Zhou Mo’s eyes brightened. "I didn't realize there were bounties for these cases. Where can I find others like this?"

The ten thousand dollars he had received wouldn't last long. His three brains required a significant amount of glucose every day, and he felt he probably needed to buy a large refrigerator. Furthermore, considering the activity of his "dog brain," he felt he couldn't keep staying in that old apartment complex; he needed to move somewhere less conspicuous and more convenient.

At this rate, the money on hand wouldn't last long. If he could earn money through bounties, and given his unique ability to see subconscious monsters, wouldn't boosting his performance be a breeze?

Xia An rolled her eyes. "Come back to the office with me later to file a report. I’ll set up an account for you to check them yourself. Do you really think you’ll run into these things every single day?"

But as the words left her mouth, she felt something was off. It actually did seem like Zhou Mo ran into these disasters every day. First, he had his head smashed, then he was assassinated by the Brain-Eaters, and now he’d encountered a subconscious monster just by going for a walk. The point was that Zhou Mo had nothing to do with these events himself, yet his dealings with the City Guard were as frequent as a day job.

*Hiss!*

Thinking of this, Xia An couldn't help but gasp. "You kid, you’re a bit of a jinx!"

Sitting in the car, Zhou Mo thought Xia An was off on another one of her tangents. He didn't want to get tangled up with this woman, so he waved his hands quickly. "No, no, I didn't know these things would happen..."

The sleepiness had completely vanished from Xia An’s face. She watched as Zhou Mo rubbed his chin, seemingly lost in thought.

Zhang Huai'an sat in the back seat, looking at Zhou Mo with envy. "You’re so lucky. I’ve been on the job for two months and haven't solved a single case."

Zhou Mo looked at Zhang Huai'an’s pale face and asked, "Are your previous injuries better? Why did you come out if you haven't recovered?" Zhou Mo had a good impression of Zhang Huai'an; he still remembered how Zhang had risked his life to hold onto Zhang Shuo’s leg to buy him a chance to escape.

Zhang Huai'an sighed. "It’s nothing major, just some rib injuries. I wanted to score some merits early, so I applied to return to duty. Besides, Deep Divers have strong recovery abilities; these minor injuries are nothing."

Zhou Mo’s eyes widened. "Is that really a thing?"

Zhang Huai'an shrugged. "Our Deep Diver abilities are both scientific and unscientific. Now that Dr. Liu Tianyou is dead, I guess no one can explain it."

Just then, a figure in a white lab coat arrived, carrying a square case and grumbling. "Zhang Huai'an, are you trying to die? If your bones are cracked, stay in the infirmary and rest! Are you worried they aren't broken enough?"

Sun Yue walked over, glanced at the possessed woman on the ground, and couldn't help but exclaim, "Her legs really are quite long!" As she spoke, she opened the case, took out a metal ring, and snapped it onto the woman's right arm.

Zhou Mo was surprised to see that, once restrained by the metal ring, the woman slowly returned to her original state. Her legs gradually returned to normal, though her left ankle was visibly swollen, and the fractures in both her hands were clearly apparent.

"Good grief, I didn't realize you had such skills." Sun Yue looked at Zhou Mo with surprise. Judging by the injuries, the blows hadn't been light.

Zhou Mo scratched his head, feeling a bit embarrassed. "It was all an accident. I didn't expect it to turn out like this." Mostly, the enemies he had encountered before hadn't been left alive. It was a bit strange not having to clean up a scene for once.

However, at that moment, Sun Yue looked at Zhou Mo’s head and said, "Wait, why have the stitches I gave you opened up? Let me tighten them for you!"

Without waiting for an answer, Sun Yue took out needle, thread, and disinfectant from her case and stepped behind Zhou Mo. Zhou Mo quickly had his "dog brain" open a crack in the back of his skull. It was all the "Brain Brother's" fault for lifting the skull cap too vigorously all day; he hadn't even noticed the stitches had come loose.

Sun Yue stood behind him, seemingly ignoring the state of the wound as she applied disinfectant and pulled the stitches tight. "What on earth have you been doing to your wound to make the thread loosen like this? Luckily, you don't need to be re-stitched; I can just tighten it up. I’m warning you: if you don’t want to end up with alopecia, stay away from your wound these next few days."

Zhou Mo felt the thread on his head pull tight. It seemed Sun Yue was putting quite a bit of effort into cinching the stitches. After finishing, she took off her gloves and said, "It’s healing quite well. You can have the stitches removed in another week."

As she spoke, she noticed the woman on the ground, thought for a moment, and pulled another metal ring from her case to toss to Zhou Mo. "You’re bound to encounter people possessed by subconscious monsters in the future, so take this subconscious suppressor and use it..."

However, before Sun Yue could finish her sentence, the metal ring snapped onto Zhou Mo’s wrist by sheer coincidence.

*Click!*

A sharp pain shot through the dog brain!